


Raging Fire

by arrows_and_fairytales



Category: Arrow (TV 2012)
Genre: F/M, Non Traditional Soulmate AU, Soulmate-Identifying Marks, olicity au
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2015-09-13
Updated: 2015-11-27
Packaged: 2018-04-20 12:22:29
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 2
Words: 1,968
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/4787132
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/arrows_and_fairytales/pseuds/arrows_and_fairytales
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p><i>"Really important meetings are planned by the souls long before the bodies see each other." </i> - Paul Coelho</p><p>The question of who she was–where she was–always buzzed at the fringes of his consciousness. Sometimes, on nights like that first one, he would wonder if she was just has messed up as he was. Or maybe she would think he was a spoiled playboy who needed to get over himself. Or perhaps she would blaze into his life, throwing him him just enough off balance to set him right again.</p>
            </blockquote>





	1. The Writing on the Hand

**Author's Note:**

  * For [Bre](https://archiveofourown.org/users/Bre/gifts), [CityofOlicity](https://archiveofourown.org/users/CityofOlicity/gifts).



> cityofolicity asked: Can I get a soulmate Au pretty pleaaaase? <3

It first appears after a night of drunken partying, as he sits on the balcony of the hotel–his legs dangling between the railing–as he wondered how much louder the pounding in his head would have to be to drown out his father’s lecture, his mother’s disappointing glances, and every television within a hundred mile radius wagering when his next screw up would be. Having a soulmate mark wasn’t uncommon–it was often used as a foolproof pick up line. A “I’ll show you mine, if you show me yours” type thing. 

But in his twenty years, Oliver Queen had never known someone to have one–not his parents, not his best friend, not even his girlfriend. So when the faint mark appeared as a warmth upon his hand, his bitter laugh rang out into the quiet Starling City night. Of course it would appear now, he thought, as he took another swig from the bottle next to him. Because it seemed the universe thought he needed yet another expectation thrust upon him–another person he would ultimately let down. 

As he glanced down at the marks appearing on his palm, he almost laughed again. They were scribbles–various ones and zeroes–jotted down in haphazard lines and sequences.

Fate clearly had a sense of humor.

<————————————————————->

As the years passed, he watched different jots appear on his arms and hands. Computer codes. Grocery lists. Phone numbers. Always in the same hand.

The question of who she was–where she was–always buzzed at the fringes of his consciousness. Sometimes, on nights like that first one, he would wonder if she was just has messed up as he was. Or maybe she would think he was a spoiled playboy who needed to get over himself. Or perhaps she would blaze into his life, throwing him him just enough off balance to set him right again. 

<————————————————————->

With the scars that began to build on the island, he often forgot about the innocent marks of a soulmate he had never met–and probably never would. However, when the nights were cold from an endless rain and his body was still wound from training with Shado, he would lay on his mat running his fingers over whatever marking had appeared–trying desperately to absorb the small flicker of warmth into his entire body. 

They varied less–now just complex codes jotted down in a rush–and they came less frequently, until they disappeared altogether. 

He thought perhaps his time on the island had severed his soulmate bond until the night before their attack on Fryers’ camp when he felt a prick on the palm of his hand–as if he had grasped the stem of a rose to tightly. And as he laid down, he had the unexplainable urge to cry. 

After that all traces of his soulmate marks disappeared. 

<————————————————————-> 

In the remaining four years on the island and his return home, he had all but forgotten about the marks. His mind too consumed with his mission, the list, concealing an identity that felt more real than his own name did. As his team grew with a soldier and a genius, that faint buzzing became imperceptible–he couldn’t pinpoint when exactly but he chalked it up to dying and coming back again. After all, if Lian Yu could affect the bond, then near death experiences had to affect it as well.

It wasn’t until they were in Russia that the marks reappeared again, and as they did he registered somewhere in the back of his mind that he was right.

He was thrown off balance.

For as Anatoly drove them through the frigid city, Oliver watched as Felicity pulled a pen from her purse and scribbled the number of Diggle’s cell in the Gulag onto her hand. He felt the warmth in his own palm simultaneously, trying to subtly tighten it into a fist. Even though it was a matter of seconds–he watched her write with a mixture of awe and fear–for as she wrote the number down it was almost as if time slowed and he could feel each one being formed on his skin; each number condemning him to an impossible fate.

Because of course it was her. The girl he couldn’t have. The girl he had to keep at arms length or his promise to protect her and keep her safe would crumble like a house of cards.

For Felicity Smoak wouldn’t just be a woman he loved, she would be his soulmate. 

The soulmate of the Arrow. The only way she would be more vulnerable is if he painted a target on her back and left her alone in the middle of the Glades.

So as the warmth radiated across his palm–stronger than it had ever been before–he blocked it out. It was a road he couldn’t–would never–go down.

<————————————————————-> 

Except four weeks later he finally realized how hard that vow would be to keep. When the young CI had sped into town, with his intelligence and boyish charm, Oliver had to use every ounce of his self discipline not to shout it out loud.

Felicity Smoak was **_his_**. His soulmate. Not Barry Allen’s. Not anyone else’s.

But he couldn’t. It was just another thing to bury and if he had to suffer knowing looks from his all-too observant brother, then so be it.

And as he reigned in his jealousy–even inviting the kid to his mother’s party in apology–he thought he had succeeded. That he would be able to maintain his distance. 

However that plan was shot to hell when he rambled about partners and worrying–the result of which was another warm mark on his skin that night. 

In the harsh light of the foundry he tugged his shirt up and found the cause.

An small arrow was marked upon his skin–brighter than any mark that had come before. And as he ran his thumb across it, he couldn’t help but let out a small laugh.

Because he was irrevocably in love with his soulmate and there wasn’t anything he could do about it


	2. Chapter 2

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Now onto Felicity's POV and her marks

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I know this took a long time, but it's finally here! Hope you all enjoy!

It appeared as a warm caress on the small of her back. She felt it only because it’s appearance seemed to slow her racing heart as she walked toward the doors. It seemed like a shield against the eyes that followed her path–eyes filled with apprehension and rejection. For it was only on paper and in the movies where child geniuses inspired wonder and appreciation.

Thousands of miles from a home she couldn’t get away from fast enough. Amongst classmates at least five years her senior. No triple digit IQ was needed to tell her she was a pariah. A lost soul with no island of misfit toys in sight.

But there was someone. A soulmate.

And as she contorted in front of the mirror that night in order to glimpse the mark upon her back, her fears ebbed back. Because while she didn’t yet have sight of the shore, at least she had a tether.

And that was enough to survive.

< ————————————- >

Felicity wasn’t quite sure when Cooper noticed the marks as he remained silent on the subject. However, she could feel his hand purposely move around each—she was gaining them with more frequency lately–as if touching them might irreparably scar him. But like a petulant child the marks would ache for attention and on nights when Cooper was gone, Felicity found herself on the roof of the dorm running her fingers over the pale brown numbers–as unassuming as a birth mark. They varied from ten to eleven digits total, but they were never more than a couple inches in length. As she ran her fingers over them in the silence of the Massachusetts night, she could swear that she could feel a warm hand being laid on her shoulder.

< ————————————- > 

After Cooper’s death, the marks followed the path of her thoughts and faded into almost nothingness. Not that they would have been noticed under her new iron mask of died hair and conservative clothes. Graduation came and went and everything--every emotion, every mark--remained buried under the babbles and sentence fragments that were the new Felicity Smoak. 

Yet it seemed that the bond was unfazed by her grief and efforts, for the marks continued to appear--faint though they were.

< ————————————- > 

Despite their increased frequency, Felicity didn’t give them a passing thought as she ran circles around her superiors, gaining a spot on the CEO’s radar. Not even their sudden halt registered with her, although it was difficult to focus on much lately in the sudden frenzy at work that hearkened the miraculous return of the prodigal son.

It wasn’t until she was struggling to carry that same prodigal son into a dingy warehouse basement that she even remembered their existence. She had never been more thankful for the sight of blood, for it kept Mr. Diggle from noticing her sharp wince as a searing pain burned across her own shoulder. The pieces began to fall into place as continued to help stitch up the broken vigilante that laid on the table before her, silently cataloging the location of each scar on his body. Each one a physical mirror to the imperceptible digits on her skin. 

_Coordinates._

_< ————————————-  >   
_

When the building shook and the city that she had fallen in love with slowly fell apart, Felicity wished to go back to a time before her revelation. Before the universe had all but built a neon sign to announce that Oliver Queen was her soulmate. That a man who was desperate to save his city whatever the cost was her soulmate.

Because perhaps if she was still ignorant, she wouldn’t feel as if half her heart was running around outside her body facing certain death.  And so the tears tumbled down her cheeks until she heard the crackle of his voice across the comms confirming that he and John had made it out of Merlyn’s hell alive. 

Although she couldn’t forget, when he ran back to the place of his own hell she sure as hell tried. Tried to get back to a normal life. Tried to ignore the fact that she could find exactly where Lian-Yu was by looking on her own body. Tried to forget that she even had a soulmate.

The operative word being tried . . . because three months later she found herself jumping out of plane and calling her hero back to Starling City with a handful of reasons, not one of which was the truth.

_< ————————————-  > _

And so began the first of months full of lying, ignoring and trying. She almost thought herself successful--after all she had learned from the best about concealing things under a mask--especially after Russia and Barry, she was finally in the clear. He might be her soulmate, but she had accepted the role as his friend, his girl Wednesday, his guide through the streets. 

Except he had to open his mouth and tell her that he needed her, that she was his partner. Words that had her in and out of a tattoo parlor getting a design that was half impulse buy, half resignation to the hand the universe had dealt her.

It was a mark that she became so accustomed to that she almost didn’t recognize it when he stood in front of her asking her a question that failed to register. The small arrowhead was a pale brown--the color of her own marks--not the emerald green of the one on her own hip. But the design was unmistakable. 

Once again, she was forced to tamp down her gasp as the universe hit her with a second undeniable truth. Oliver Queen was her soulmate. . . 

_and she was his._

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Come find me on Tumblr at [padawanwithacrown](https://padawanwithacrown.tumblr.com/) and don't be afraid to drop a prompt.

**Author's Note:**

> Come find me on Tumblr at [padawanwithacrown](https://padawanwithacrown.tumblr.com/) and don't be afraid to drop a prompt.


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